Alert! The Writivism Residency, a new opportunity for emerging African Writers, has been announced.
The announcement was made by the Kampala-based Centre for African Cultural Excellence (CACE) in collaboration with the Stellenbosch University English Department.
Writivism is a pan-African literary initiative that promotes emerging African writers through workshops, mentoring, publishing, prizes, a festival and activities in schools.
The inaugural writer-in-residence is Pemi Aguda, the winner of the 2015 Writivism Short Story Prize, who will be at Stellenbosch University in the Western Cape from 1-30 September, 2016.
The residency will give Aguda the freedom to work on a fiction manuscript. She will also have the opportunity to participate in reading groups, public lectures and other literary activities in the department, and will do a public reading or seminar on her writing.
“Writivism is the gift that keeps giving,” Aguda says. “I’m looking forward to this writing month away to work with the University community.”
Writivism Short Story Prize winners receive $400 prize money (about R6,000), which as CACE Partnerships Director Bwesigye Bwa Mwesigire points out “isn’t enough foundation for an emerging writer to build a career”.
“This residency is important because to make a writing career work, one needs the space, time, and a community supportive of their endeavours,” Mwesigire says. “This residency will be a game-changer.”
EC Osondu, novelist and member of the Writivism Board of Trustees, says: “This is a wonderful gift of ‘a room of one’s own’ and time. A gift that every writer needs – even more so the emerging African writer.”
Basic funding for the residency is provided by the Miles Morland Foundation, while Stellenbosch University will support the programme “in kind”.
Stellenbosch University English Department Chair Professor Sally-Ann Murray says her colleagues are excited to inaugurate the partnership.
“The residency is a great opportunity for us to host emergent African and Caribbean literary talent, and to give our existing pan African academic networks a vital creative energy,” she says. “And who knows, perhaps this small beginning can lead to further collaborations – participation in workshops, festivals, seminars.”
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